Wall Street closed mixed Friday with stocks trading in a narrow range. Strong retail sales data and easing U.S.-China trade tensions spurred investors, who bought more value stocks and rotated out of tech stocks. The Dow rose for an eighth straight session. But weakness in Apple and Broadcom shares dragged the Nasdaq down. The major indexes rose for a third straight week.
Clear Harbor Asset Management CEO Aaron Kennon:
SOUNDBITE: CLEAR HARBOR ASSET MANAGEMENT CEO, AARON KENNON (ENGLISH) SAYING:
"The market observers have frankly been exhausted going into the end of the week here. We've head a lot going on in the geopolitical front. Nothing fundamentally new today."
China's Xinhua News Agency reported Beijing would exempt some U.S. pork and soybeans from additional tariffs. That drove up shares of meat processor Tyson Foods.
Broadcom shares dropped. The chipmaker's rising revenue missed analysts estimates for the third straight quarter. It said it wasn't clear when a recovery in demand for microchips would take place. That added to negative signals for Apple, whose shares were also hit by Goldman Sachs' move to cut its price target.
Shares of Etsy rose for the fifth straight session. Wedbush Securities upgraded the online craft retailer to "outperform" from "neutral," saying free shipping, among other things, will help boost order values.

Broadcom Inc's (NASDAQ: AVGO) slight miss on revenue, a semiconductor demand trough and trade difficulties with China had investors selling the stock off Friday, but sell-side analysts remained bullish, saying the trough has bottomed and the company can weather the international storm. While Broadcom’s revenue was slightly below Street estimates, EPS came in slightly ahead. Bank of America analyst Vivek Arya reiterated a Buy rating with a $345 price target.

The S&P 500 ended the day down slightly on Friday but less than 1% below its all-time high as a drop in Apple stock countered cooling U.S.-China trade tensions. Tariff-vulnerable industrials helped keep the blue-chip Dow in positive territory, which has now gained in eight straight sessions, its longest winning streak since May 2018. All three major U.S. stock indexes posted their third straight weekly gains, capping a week that saw signs of a potential thaw in the trade war between the world's two largest economies, which has gripped markets for months.

Losses in shares of U.S. technology majors Apple and Broadcom held the S&P 500 just under record levels on Friday, as traders balanced the latest indicators of an uncertain global growth outlook with perceived progress in Sino-U.S. trade relations. Broadcom Inc, among the world's biggest chipmakers, weighed on the tech-heavy Nasdaq with a 2.6% fall, after it said in results late on Thursday that demand for microchips had bottomed out and that a recovery was not yet on the cards.

Losses in shares of U.S. technology majors Apple and Broadcom set Wall Street for a subdued end to the week, as traders balanced the latest indicators of uncertain global growth outlook with perceived progress in Sino-U.S. trade relations. Broadcom Inc, among the world's biggest chipmakers, weighed on the tech-heavy Nasdaq after it said in results late on Thursday that demand for microchips had bottomed out and that a recovery was not yet on the cards.

Broadcom has become a bit of a snoozer. My stance has been this: the company is focused on free cash flow, essentially annuitizing itself. You read through analysts reactions and you'll find notes touting the attractiveness of the company's focus on returning 50% of its free cash flow to investors.

U.S. stocks opened mostly higher on Friday, pushing the Dow and the S&P 500 closer to their all-time highs, as investors were buoyed by a combination of positive consumer data, receding U.S.-China trade tensions and a boost from easing central banks. The S&P 500 was up less than 0.1% to 3,011. The Dow Jones Industrial Average advanced 50 points, or 0.2%, to around 27,233. The Nasdaq Composite was down 0.1% to 8,187. The Commerce Department reported retail sales rose 0.4% in August, much higher than the 0.1% growth expected by economists. Trade tensions also appeared to wane after Beijing agreed to exempt U.S. agricultural goods from tariffs. In company news, shares of Broadcom Inc. fell 0.9% after the chip maker's outlook for annual revenues disappointed.

Broadcom CEO Hock Tan is the kind of corporate leader that you end up rooting for, if anything because he's one aggressive fire-eating type of hard-charger. After the closing bell had peeled it's last on Thursday, Broadcom reported fiscal third quarter financial results. The firm put to the tape adjusted EPS of $5.16 to the tape, beating expectations, while posting revenue generation of $5.52 billion, good enough for 9.1% year over year growth, just a smidge below consensus.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average marked its eighth-straight winning session Friday while the broader markets finished mixed as investors assessed signs of a breakthrough in U.S.-China trade talks and aggressive stimulus from the European Central Bank. Apple shares dropped after analysts at Goldman Sachs slash their price target on the tech giant amid concerns that the free trial for its Apple TV+ offering will eat into its bottom line. Broadcom fell after the chipmaker posted stronger-than-expected third quarter earnings but warned that a recovery in global semiconductor markets could take longer than forecast.

Yesterday, Wall Street got a couple of different headlines from President Trump -- including a 15-day delay on tariffs that were expected to go into effect Oct. 1, and then Trump said that he could be interested in an interim trade deal with China, which was followed by China saying that it would exclude U.S. soybeans and pork from additional tariffs. In his Real Money column Friday morning, Cramer wrote about the impact of the U.S.-China trade war on stocks and broke down what stocks were being held "hostage" by the trade war.